Agrarian Discontent and the 19th Century
America, like any other nation, has always relied heavily on agriculture. Differing from other nations, however, is the problems that agriculture has created through America's brief history. It can be argued that the Civil War was started by agriculture; the South developed as an agricultural dependent region, while the North developed as a manufacturing region; creating two distinct, almost separate cultures. Some twenty years after the Civil War, new problems were arising; that of agrarian discontent. Farmers of the 1880s and 90s were having a harder and harder time getting by. Mother Nature was showing no mercy; through grasshoppers, floods, and draughts. But the farmers placed the blame of their problems on two main areas; the money supply, and the railroads.In the late 1800s deflation became a major problem for the farmers. Farmers were suffering losses year after year and were forced to have their mortgages foreclosed on, as they saw it, by their "Eastern Master (Doc D)." The reason the farmers blamed this "Eastern Master" was no one was aiding them in their falling prices. The Populist Party felt that silver was the answer, and not coining it was a "vast conspiracy against mankind" across "two continents, and it
It would not make farming less laborious or more profitable (Doc B). Others, such as the farmer's urging of the issue of silver money, were not so reasonable. ) What they were incorrect in was their assumption that silver was the solution. " While deflation and the nation's currency were an issue in the United States, the arguments and solutions of the farmers were often misguided. " Farmers were correct in arguing that the United States' money supply was not what it should be; over 30 years the population nearly double while the money circulation rose by only 60 %( Doc C. In the ideal situation it allowed the farmer to easily transport his raw goods to the market, making him larger profits. These raised prices only further drove the struggling farmer farther into debt. The new rate ate up every cent of his gains. " To look at it from the farmer's point of view, Frank Norris wrote The Octopus. " He also emphasized that silver would not make "labor easier, the hours shorter, or the pay better. Make? Why, I will owe,--I'll be-be-that ruins me, do you understand. Often times, it did not work this way, however.
Common topics in this essay:
Frank Norris,
McKinley McKinley,
Civil War,
Mother Nature,
Agricultural Unrest,
United States',
Cullom Committee,
Populist Party,
,
Eastern Master,
civil war,
money supply,
eastern master,
|
Acceptance Essays
